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In Context: Early-1900s Yup’ik Dance Mask, Yup’ik Tradition and Shorebird Conservation

4 - 6:30 p.m. Tuesday, April 22

Discovery Center, Art Lab

In-Person Event

Shorebirds are part of the diet and culture of the Yup’ik people in the Yukon-Kuskokwim Delta. Shorebirds that breed in Alaska migrate across oceans and continents to wintering grounds in New Zealand, South America, and beyond. A Yup’ik dance mask representing a long-billed shorebird, or sugg’erpak, highlights the connections of Yup’ik people with their culture and homeland and the importance of fully including Indigenous peoples in bird and shorebird conservation. 

Free; registration recommended. Registrants will have the opportunity to make pledges toward shorebird stewardship and paint shorebirds on precut material.

In Context is a Museum program in which community members provide context for the history, art, science, and culture of Alaska and the North.

About the Presenters

Liliana Naves is an oceanographer with a background in avian research. Naves received a Ph.D. in Biodiversity at the University Pierre et Marrie Curie-Sorbonne in France. Since 2007, Naves has worked with the Division of Subsistence of the Alaska Department of Fish and Game. Her work blends natural and social sciences and has focused on bird harvest assessment, local and traditional knowledge, and outreach and education. Naves received the Isleib Award in 2023 from the Alaska Bird Conference, which recognizes outstanding contributions to bird conservation in Alaska.

Arin Underwood, a wildlife biologist in southcentral Alaska, studies boreal waterbirds and small mammals.

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